


What Blair Would Wish For

by Bluewolf458



Category: The Sentinel
Genre: Gen, Sentinel Thursday
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-22
Updated: 2018-07-22
Packaged: 2019-06-14 10:41:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 561
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15387003
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bluewolf458/pseuds/Bluewolf458
Summary: The title says it all





	What Blair Would Wish For

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the SenTh prompt 'machine'

What Blair Would Wish For

by Bluewolf

"You know," Blair said, his voice ever so slightly dreamy, "if some fairy godmother granted me a wish - just one, I wouldn't need three - I'd wish for a time machine."

"Time machine?" Jim asked, his voice slightly disbelieving. "First of all, nobody can travel through time! The future is still some indeterminate time to come - you can make a guess at what might happen in the future, based on what's happening today, but the past is gone, over and done with. The only way you can 'visit' the past is through reading books written back in the past, or digging up fossils or excavating places like the tombs of the Pharaohs. And from what I've read of the past, there are times I'd give the fortune I might one day inherit from Dad to avoid - even if there was a time machine available!"

Blair grinned. "I know," he said. "It's one of those wishes you know is an impossibility. But there are times I wish it were possible to visit the ancient Maya, or the Aztecs, or a culture that really did live in the Stone Age, and see at first hand how they lived, instead of having to depend on extrapolation based on things we have found or the often prejudiced writings of the invading Europeans, who saw the native inhabitants of the countries they entered as primitive savages, their cultures ungodly - it was their duty to destroy primitive ignorance and replace it by European values. Today, tribes like the Chopek are living a modified stone age culture - even the few who have no direct contact with the white man's technology have been influenced to some degree through the tribes that do have contact."

"And in five thousand years' time the anthropologists will be wishing they could visit twentieth century America instead of depending on the writing of people like Dr. Blair Sandburg," Jim chuckled.

"I suppose," Blair agreed. "But at least my writing isn't prejudiced by my visiting here from a more technological culture. It's accurate."

"But will the anthropologists of the future realize that?" Jim's voice was suddenly serious.

"They should... but if they don't, I won't be around to see hear their comments on what they think really happened."

"Even if your mythical fairy godmother made it possible for you to visit the year 7000?"

"I'd probably end up laughing my head off at their misinterpretation of what they'd found."

"And not try to tell them how wrong they were?" Jim teased.

"They probably wouldn't believe me if I did," Blair admitted. "No - I'd like to see the reality of life as it was - but I know that if I did, and if I were to come back talking about it, nobody would believe me. There's too much that everyone 'knows' from the remains that are left. And I suspect it'll be the same in the year 7000. If someone from today tried telling the anthropologists of 7000 what life today is really like... they'd either think we couldn't possibly be so primitive, or we couldn't possibly be so advanced.

"No. What I'd like and what's possible or even desirable are two completely different things. I'll write what I can and hope it's believed - even five thousand years in the future.

"Books are the only time machine we'll ever have."


End file.
